Kingdom
by InsertHilariousPenNameHere
Summary: Sophia's prank goes a little too far, and Daniel Hebert wakes up to another dead woman in his life and a brain full of superpowers. Things only get worse from there.
1. Chapter 1

**Phylum 1.1**

Walking through these halls felt like a death march. Knowing that this was the place that had taken my daughter away from me... I felt ill. I didn't want to be here, no more than she had ever did. She had been bullied. Right here, right under my nose – and I didn't notice. What kind of a father did that make me, huh?

None at all. Not any more, at least.

I didn't know why I had come here. This place... there was nothing left for me. Nothing except the knowledge that I had been helpless, unable to stop it. I hadn't come here for any reason, really. I had left the house, and walked, and ended up here.

God, what would Annette think if she could see me now? Losing the two most important people in my life, and being so utterly _useless_... I couldn't call myself a father or a husband. Not then, and certainly not now.

"Um, sir? What are you doing here?" A confused voice asked from behind me. I turned slightly, to see a harrowed, tired boy. Classic signs of exhaustion, even apart from the dark bags under his eyes. His hair was greasy, and he had a concentration of acne scars across his cheeks. Definitely stressed. "Are you one of the new teachers?"

I hesitated, wondering how to reply. "Ah... no." I finally answered. "I'm here... well, I'm sure you know about the girl last month who..."

The boys eyes widened fractionally. "You mean T-Taylor?" He finally answered, his voice sounding shocked. I nodded.

"Did- did you know her?" He finally said. I almost chuckled at the dark irony.

"Know her? Well, I'm her father, but I don't think I ever really knew Taylor, not after the... bullying started."

The boy seemed to hesitate, before holding out his hand to shake. "I-I'm Greg. I was Taylor's friend-," he seemed to cut himself off, before hanging his head. "Well, I don't know if I can really call myself that. I thought we were friends, but I don't think she ever really acknowledged me. And I didn't do anything..." He choked, as I watched on in silence. "I couldn't do anything to stop... it."

I shook his hand. "Greg... what do you know about the girls who bullied her?"

Emma Barnes and Madison Clements I had known about. Those were the two that had been punished – ten years, potentially, as both had shown true remorse and, in the case of Emma Barnes, been considered mentally unhealthy, possibly suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

As if that was an excuse for murder. Had I been the judge, those two would be in prison for life. They both deserved to rot in hell for what they'd done. The murder of an innocent girl, and they get ten years, with the possibility of parole? I had been disgusted.

I still hadn't spoken with Alan. I don't know if I could. Knowing that his daughter had done... _this,_ had taken away the person that mattered most to me... We would probably never be friends, not after this. He was lucky enough for his daughter to get just ten years.

But Sophia... I hadn't known about her. Greg told me she had been one of the more involved bullies. One of the more violent ones.

Yet I'd never even known that there was a third bully. So why hadn't she been brought to justice?

I couldn't sleep. Not anymore, not after everything that had happened. I didn't want to. If I did... I shook my head. I couldn't sleep. Not now. I had to... _do_ things.

After Taylor's... death, something had happened. I saw ideas, possibilities, blueprints – the building blocks of _life_. I knew that, if I re-purposed the adrenal gland of a certain species of bird, I could combine with the genes of certain insects to create an organ whose only purpose was spraying acid.

The limited research I had been able to do had told me I had powers. I wasn't totally sure what they were – the closest I could find was that I was a Tinker, but Tinkers dealt in machines, not _life_.

I almost hated them. It was like the world was rewarding me for being so _ignorant_ of my daughter's life that she had _died_. But...

Taylor had always been interested in capes. I still remembered when she begged me to buy Armsmaster underwear, back when Annette...

Taylor would have loved to be a cape. She'd always loved Alexandria, looked up to her – and now I could carry her vicariously on. Through me, she could live on, as a cape – as a hero. I could become strong, and I could honour her.

Tears welled in my eyes. I brushed them away, and set to work.

I was unsure of where to start. There were so many ideas I wanted to try, and I needed to get them right.

I decided to start by creating my lab. I would need certain supplies in order to do my work, and the basement was the only place that enabled me to be private, in case someone came round. I cleared it out, dumped most of the junk upstairs, and began to set up. It wasn't exactly clean, and contaminants would be horrendous for my work.

I needed to create a sort of bio-ventilation system. One that would filter the air of contaminants, use them to sustain itself, and provide clean and fresh air to work in. That would be something to work on – I'd be unable to create it in a day, so I had to get started in the kitchen. But I would need supplies first – and a lot of biomass.

I shuddered slightly. This was... a huge undertaking, creating life. Genetically modifying, growing, and editing a living being. I didn't know if I was ready for it. Would I be able to handle the responsibility? And worse... what if I couldn't control my creations? What if they went rampaging, started destroying things? I couldn't stop that – I would need some kind of failsafe. A biological self-destruct button.

I let out a shaky breath. I hadn't even started yet, and there was so much to consider. I wrote down a list of supplies, and tried to calm down. It was late – I wouldn't be able to start until tomorrow. Instead of going to bed, I grabbed a sketchbook and wrote down a list of what I would need. There would be lots of visits to the pet store in my future.

I couldn't sleep. I didn't want to dream – not now. Not this soon. I flipped a few pages in the sketchbook, and started drawing the blueprints in my head.

Surgical equipment – check. Several varieties of fish and lizard – check. Microscope – check. And several different kinds of bleach, detergents, and other assorted chemicals he could buy without suspicion – check.

That was what I needed for the preliminary set-up. In the future, I'd be able to produce artificial enzymes to mimic the chemicals, and possibly a biological component for examining and identifying genetic markers. And after my initial buying of fish and lizards, I'd be able to clone them instead of buying more. For the most part, I was set.

I had time before my bereavement leave was over. Next month, was it? I wasn't sure. I'd be called when the Union needed me back – back to the days of telling people that they wouldn't be getting jobs.

I sighed, and carried the box of surgical equipment into the house. I set it on the table, and went back to the car for the large fish tank I'd bought. The fish would arrive separately – it was too dangerous to carry them with me. Likewise, there was no water in the tank currently. Actually, I was thinking of replacing it with a kind of primordial soup, chock full of amino acids to better synthesise new organisms-

I cut myself off mentally. It was better to focus on the here and now, rather than the future.

I laid the fish tank down on the kitchen table, and went to grab the lizards.

Setting up the equipment in the basement came first. I moved the wooden table in the front room to the basement (not an easy task, let me tell you) and put a surgical sheet over it. I set up the fish tank in one corner of the room, now full of water, and the lizard tank in another corner, under a heat source. I'd pick up the fish a little later.

I set up the surgical equipment on a rolling table by the side of the long table – a selection of scalpels, stitches, and various chemicals that I might need. There were also several petri dishes for growing tissue cultures.

Creating the bio-ventilation system would be a quick and dirty job – an extensively modified set of gills, a digestive system, and a heart. Before that, however, I needed some growth hormone to accelerate the process. Which meant I needed a brain – or at least a pituitary gland.

Oh boy.

I took a sample of the lizard brain to start. Cloned it, to get my own growing brain. I'd need to set up a method of oxygen delivery and blood supply, but after that it should be okay. Whilst it grew to necessary size to start producing growth hormone, I consulted my sketchbook for anything I could do in the meantime. Setting up a hormone to gradually increase bone density and muscle fibre over the course of a few weeks wouldn't be too hard.

I rubbed my head and tried not to think about how different things would have been if I'd had these powers before Taylor had died. Before Annette had died.

I set to work.

I needed to create a method of delivery, directly releasing regular shots of the durability hormone once the previous shot had taken effect. I had to key it in directly to the adrenal gland, so that it would be released alongside it – from then, it was a simple matter of buzzing my 'fight-or-flight' response every couple of days.

Ingesting the hormone, and giving it responses to releases of specific chemicals – i.e. adrenaline – would cause it to activate.

The best way to do that would be to get in a fight. And the best way to justify _that_ was to be a hero. But in order to be a hero, I needed some form of protection. A Catch 22, if ever there was one.

The brain would grow to my purposes sufficiently in about a week. Until then, I needed some way of protecting myself and still fighting. Unfortunately... that was impossible. So I'd be getting into fights the old-fashioned way – with my fists.

"Hey!" I called out to the man with the knife, and both he and the kid getting mugged looked over to me. "Stop!"

"The fuck?" The thug said, and let go of the kid. He ran. "You wanna fuckin' fight, old man?"

"I wouldn't call you getting your ass beaten a 'fight,'" I replied, crouching slightly and bringing up my fists.

"Oh, it is fuckin' _on,_ dipshit!" He yelled, half incredulous and half furious.

He came at me with the knife. I kept my eyes on it and, at his thrust, stepped to the side and grabbed his arm. Keeping it away from me, I sent a punch into the side of his face. "Ow, fuck!" Note to self – punching people hurts you as much as it does them.

The man stumbled back, spitting with rage, and a trickle of blood ran out of his nostril. I didn't let up – I stepped in close again and punched him in the side of the head again, and this time he went down, but I didn't stop I just kept punching and punching him in the head again and again and again-

I stepped back, panting. My knuckles were painted with blood, and the sleeves of my coat were flecked with dark spots. The would-be mugger lay in a pool of his own blood. I choked a little, bile welling in my throat. I stepped forward and checked his pulse. Faint, but there.

He had a phone in his jacket pocket, and I fished it out. For a moment I fumbled – it was passworded – but there was an 'emergency call' button that I frantically pressed.

"He-Hello, I need an ambulance, this guy tried to mug someone and got beaten up pretty badly-" I was cut off by the calm voice of the operator, and as I gave the location of the scene, I fled.

This had been a bad idea.

I still felt ill whenever I thought of what had happened. I'd let my fury over the situation overcome me, and I had nearly _killed_ someone. If I'd been any stronger than I was now – he'd be dead.

I nearly threw up for the second time that night.

I went down to the lab. The brain was growing nicely, and I decided now was the point to cull the unimportant parts, and ensure it's maturing into a glorified growth hormone farm.

For a time, I buried myself in my Tinkering. There was so much I was trying to escape, now.

After three days, my durability hormone had built up, unable to be released as I hadn't experienced anything particularly fight-or-flight worthy. I suspected that the next time adrenaline was released, I'd experience a noticeable boost in strength and bone density. But I didn't know if I wanted to get in a fight so soon. I didn't even know if I'd be able to control my anger, or if I really would... _kill_ someone, next time.

After four days, the buildup was a constant feeling of pressure in my gut, but the brain had finally matured – I used infusions of lizard blood to keep it oxygenated, and I could now start stimulating to produce growth hormone. That would allow me to grow the bio-ventilator, which would allow me to work on larger-scale projects without worrying about contamination.

In addition, I'd gotten the fish, so I'd be able to use some of their genes – modified, of course – to grow the air-gills for the ventilator.

Everything seemed to be working out.

I was with Kurt and Lacey when it happened. They'd talked me into going to Fugly Bob's with them, get some food into me, open up about what I was feeling. I'd agreed to go, eventually, but I wasn't willing to talk about it. Not yet.

Maybe not ever.

Fugly Bob's was mainly empty. Not a full house today, not as bustling, but there were a decent number of customer's around.

We were in the middle of an awkward silence. It felt like Lacey wanted to say something, but didn't know how to broach the subject without making things even more awkward. I appreciated her consideration, I really did – but I couldn't help her. I'd just opened my mouth to tell her so, when the two men burst in.

They were both wearing plain white masks, and both held guns – the taller one a pistol, the other some sort of compact machine gun. Machine pistol?

"All right everyone, keep calm and no one gets hurt. Just give us your fucking money and we'll be out of your hair. And I don't want to see any fucking cellphones, you hear me?!" The first, taller one yelled out. They were both dressed in similar, dark clothes, and the second one had a duffel bag strung over his back.

I could already feel the adrenal response, as boatload of durability hormone dumped itself into my blood. I suddenly felt incredibly heavy, and when I squeezed the edge of the table nervously, the wood cracked and splintered beneath my hand.

Oh, fuck. Now I had to do something. I turned to Kurt and Lacey. "I'm going to do something monumentally stupid, okay? But... trust me." Kurt opened his mouth to say something, but I was already sliding out of my chair whilst the taller one's back was turned.

The small one, supposedly the muscle, was in the back, busting the safe to get the money. Or whatever they did when robbing a restaurant. I went up right behind the taller one, doing my best to make sure I was quiet, despite how heavy my body felt.

I clapped one hand over his mouth and grabbed his wrist in the other. At least, tried to. I ended up crushing the bones in his wrist and forcing him to drop his gun, and he let out a muffled scream. The mask, where before it prevented people from recognising him, now served as a pretty decent buffer for his voice, and prevented him from biting me. The customers stared in shock, and I let go of his crushed wrist to make a 'shhh' motion with my hand.

I dragged him over to the back, and carefully manoeuvred both myself and the would-be criminal over the counter. Peeking round the back, I saw the small one stuffing cash into his bag from the busted safe, a crowbar beside him. I took a deep breath, and tried to decide on a plan of action.

The only one I could really think of was to throw the tall one at the shorter one. After that... call the police, I supposed. What else could I do? Say that it was an 'adrenaline high,' claim that it was just a heat of the moment thing?

That was... kinda accurate. It was the only plan I had.

I threw the first guy at the second.

It had been trivial after that. Beating down the two aggressors had taken less than a minute, and the police showed up soon after. They had taken the statements of the people involved, and I had been congratulated on what I'd done.

There were some question on how I'd crushed the man's wrist, but I had shrugged, and told them it was an adrenaline high, knowing the right weak spot, or some combination of the two. What could I say?

I left without bothering to say goodbye to Kurt and Lacey. Despite the activity of the day – or perhaps because of it – I felt exhausted. Both physically and mentally – some combination of coming down from the adrenaline high, and the weariness that the durability hormone had enacted left me feeling drained. Fortunately, that should have been the last of it, so I wouldn't need to worry about getting any stronger.

That still left me with the strength of a bull, and the weight to match it. It hopefully wouldn't affect my precision, but I might needed to come up with some kind of strength reducer to compensate-

The phone rang. I sighed, and heaved myself to my feet. Making sure to be extra careful, I picked the phone off the receiver and held it to my ear.

"Hello?" I asked. "Who is it?"

"Hello. Danny." Came the calm, male voice from the other end of the line. "You don't know me. But I know you."

"Who is this?" I asked again, frowning slightly now. "What do you want?"

"Just to give you some... information." I could almost here the person on the other end smiling. "You see, the girl who killed your daughter, Sophia Hess?"

I sucked in a sharp breath. What was he getting at?

"She has a secret - a very _special_ secret."

-/-/-/-


	2. Chapter 2

**Phylum 1.2**

" _You understand that I can't just trust a random person on the phone because they say so." Danny said warily._

" _I understand. Don't worry, Mr. Hebert, you'll get your proof." He could almost hear the voice on the other end smile sinisterly. "And with it, an opportunity for revenge."_

" _...What do you mean by that?" Danny said, even more cautious now._

" _Why, Mr. Hebert, surely you don't mean to say you'll just let a supposed '_ hero' _get away with the murder of your daughter." Danny tensed, but the voice continued. "Besides, with that laboratory you have in your basement, you have the means to wreak vengeance."_

 _Danny slowly pulled the phone away from his ear and, hand shaking, placed it on the receiver._

 _On the other end of the line, a smile slid onto Coil's visage._

 _The pieces were falling into place._

"Danny!" Kurt called, as he spotted me walking down the corridor. "Danny, I... you're back at work, huh?"

I nodded, and gave him a tired smile. "Yeah. I figured I needed to get out and get my mind off of things, y'know?"

Kurt nodded sympathetically. "Well, just remember that you've got people to talk to if ou need them, okay?"

"Will do, Kurt, will do." I turned and walked into my office, taking a seat at the desk. I should have been drawing up another proposal for the re-vitalisation of the Docks, but... my mind was on other things.

Ever since the incident at Fugly Bob's, my mind had been spinning with ideas. Organ modifications, combat enhancements, organic weaponry – so many blueprints, ideas, plans. I'd barely been able to focus on work, ever since I'd come back. Together with the bombshell that the voice had dropped on me...

Not that I necessarily believed it. I had no way of knowing if Sophia truly was Shadow Stalker, but I'd done some digging. Supposedly, the family had been able to hash out some kind of deal and have her transferred to a private facility. That kind of influence could only have been had with backing. Backing like from the PRT.

I didn't pretend to know why, or even if, the PRT were protecting her. If I had to guess, it would be for the same reason that corporations covered up their scandals – it would ruin them as an organisation. Still, I didn't have any proof, either. I didn't even know if I could get proof. Accusing the PRT of covering up the crimes of one of their employees would just bring into light that Sophia Hess was Shadow Stalker – if she was – and that could lead to some serious problems.

I still had no way of figuring out the truth. If I joined the Protectorate, would they reveal it to me? Or just keep it from me even more? I didn't want to join a gang, even if that would give me the resources to find out. And there was no record of the location Hess was being kept at, so there was no way to ask her myself. Besides, she wouldn't tell me, even if I did.

And if I found her what would I do? I had been trying to keep a lid on my anger, ever since I had found out about... Taylor, but... if I came face to face with the killers... I'd do something I would regret.

Even now, thinking about what she had done-

The edge of the desk broke off in my hands, leaving me holding a chunk of wood. "Fuck," I muttered to myself, and stood up to brush the fragments of my lap. The chunk of wood was still in my hand, so I tucked it under the desk and tried to forget about it.

I stewed at my desk for the rest of the day, trying to ignore the dark thoughts.

When I returned home, it was to find a slim file resting on the kitchen table, labelled 'CLASSIFIED INFORMATION.' I tensed, and whipped my head around, seeking the point of entry and wondering how in the _hell_ this file had gotten into my house – and if the perpetrator was still here.

Slowly, I approached the file. I had no way of knowing what was inside it, but if this was from that man on the phone... I pulled my shirt over my nose, in case there was a gas inside designed to knock me out. I'd learnt that Tinkers were in high demand, so it was definitely a possible tactic.

I flipped the front of the file open and backed away a couple of the steps, tensed for the hiss of escaping air. None came, so I approached the file again, and picked it up.

The first few pages were side by side comparisons of Sophia Hess and Shadow Stalker in similar poses, demonstrating just how similar they appeared. Then there were a few transcripts from the arrests she had made, along with conversations she'd had at school and at home. I had no idea how he'd gotten any of this, but it implied that he was a man of great power – and that he wanted me to know, or at least believe that.

If any of it was real.

I flipped through a few more pages of 'evidence,' along with a comparison of fingerprints found on her crossbows and Sophia Hess's prints. Then, at the back, was a disc. It was unlabelled, so I was wary of putting it into the computer, but at this point... I had to know.

I already half-believed it. I needed confirmation.

I could already feel the familiar heat of anger approaching. I was already so infuriated at Barnes and Clement – but I had staved it off because they were stupid kids who were truly regretful, and they were getting what they deserved. I'd already divined that Sophia Hess had had a part in Taylor's... _murder_ , but to find out she was also a government agent – a hero and a Ward, no less – would push me over the edge of barely-contained rage into fury.

I stood up, booted up the ageing laptop, and slid the disc into the drive. I clicked my way through several menus, barely restraining myself from mashing the keys, and pressed play.

It was security footage, was my first thought. A camera from just behind a desk, in some kind of office. As I watched, a large woman waddled in and took a seat, an expression of annoyance visible before she turned to take a seat. For a while she just did paperwork, made calls, and drank coffee. Skipped ahead slightly, to when she picked up a phone and said, "bring up Hess."

I stiffened. This was proof. Cold, hard, no way of doubting it, proof. If the girl that came into that room was Sophia Hess, I would know that a hero had killed my little girl.

The door opened on the video, and a dark-skinned girl stepped inside, a hockey mask pushed up on top of her head. She was escorted by a PRT officer. It was Sophia Hess.

She didn't even look regretful. She looked _annoyed_.

My anger nearly boiled over right then and there. Seeing this murderer free, able to do whatever she _wanted,_ and she was just fucking _annoyed?!_

I took a calming breath and set my jaw, eyes narrowed. I decided to keep watching, keep listening, to see what reason they could possibly have for allowing her to walk free. There was a short conversation which I didn't quite catch, before I hurried to turn up the volume.

"...Extremely lucky that Director Costa-Brown took a hand in your case. Were it up to me you'd already be in jail right now for a long time. But apparently the Director wants to keep things quiet, so you've been given a transfer to Boston were you'll be punished there, in the interest of protecting your identity and the PRT's credibility." The woman's words only brought a frown further on to my face. My glare deepened. "We anticipate you should be back in the Protectorate once you turn eighteen, under _very_ strict guidelines."

Through it all, Hess's look of annoyance had lightened slightly, morphing into the tiniest hint of a smirk, before collapsing back into annoyance. I barely noticed. As soon as I heard the final words of Piggot's speech, I let out an indistinguishable snarl and put my fist through the screen. There was a shower of sparks and crunch as shards of metal and plastic were flung across the room.

I panted heavily, my face twisted in rage, and slowly pulled the laptop off of my arm, ignoring the blood from the scratches it had caused. I went back to the file – the man had mentioned a way to take vengeance on Hess. Before I had been wary, but now?

Now I was _pissed._

I flipped through it again and found a sheaf of paper, detailing when the transfer would occur, a month or so from now. Hess would be escorted in a PRT van, to prevent her from escaping. She'd be escorted by Miss Militia, apparently armed with an electrical Tinkertech weapon to disable her if she did escape. Theere would also be two decoy vans in case a gang caught wind of what had happened – but the course of the true van was laid out here. I glared at it, and carefully placed it back on the table.

I had work to do.

I had to confess, I'd had no idea of how to go about being a cape, especially a Tinker. How did I start, what did I need first? I'd been able to set up the bio-ventilator easily enough, as well as the growth hormone producer. The durability hormone was just something quick that I had worked on when I had wanted to join the Protectorate-

I had placed band-aids on the moderately serious wounds, and I'd had to stitch one of the longer gashes myself – fortunately, my power let me know just how to do it to allow it to heal best – and I'd washed my hands.

I had done some research, and the most common denominator between active Tinkers was their use of 'power armour,' based around their specialty. There were obvious exceptions, but when I considered how to make power armour for myself, my mind went to the most obvious real-world option – an exoskeleton.

Growing one was... easy enough. I was already part way through creating a chrysalis for growing my more exotic materials that I wouldn't be able to obtain from regular stores. Really, I was quite lucky – a lot of biology was chemistry, and a lot of the chemicals I needed could either be extracted from household animals or myself, or found in household items.

The chrysalis was for growing products I couldn't get from those sources – and I could also use it to grow parts of my cape persona. Such as an exoskeleton. I would need to begin growing them on a human-scale level immediately with copious amounts of growth hormone. I would need to provide a sample of my own DNA for an example of what to build it to the scale of, and with use of the durability hormone, it would be incredibly tough.

It would also be very difficult to lift by a baseline human – fortunately, my own use of the durablity hormone had granted me enough strength to lift it. Some more might be needed, but I should be able to handle it capably.

Muscle fibres would connect each part of the skeleton, so I would need a way of quickly regrowing it to fit it on each time. Luckily, I could use some solvent hormones to bind them together, and dissolve it with another hormone. That would allow me to bind each part together – although I would need to allow time for the muscle fibres to regrow each time I used it. I would be able to place it back in the chrysalis after each night, so that should be fine.

Generally however, there were other features integrated into Tinkertech suits. Fortunately, I had a few ideas. It wouldn't be too difficult to build in some organisms to increase it's combat capability and other utilities. Taking inspiration from animals such as the bombardier beetle – which used a combination of hydroquinone and hydrogen peroxide to create a hot, noxious chemical spray. I could build that into an arm with relative ease, encasing the organ in the skeleton to hide it's vulnerable flesh.

I could also take from the venom produced by bees and wasps for stingers, perhaps in the fingertips themselves. If I used a combination of muscles and bones working in tandem, they could become retractable – similar to a cat's claws. The method of delivery would most likely be quite similar to how a wasp's sting works, but the venom itself could be variable. Bees used melittin, a peptide that breaks up cell membranes – but their venom was mixed with a lot of water.

If I upped the concentration of the melittin, it could cause an extremely painful gash when injected. But bees also used phospholipase as the most painful component of their sting – which breaks down the membranes of the blood vessels themselves, and causes the release of pain-inducing agents. Combined, they caused the incredible pain of the bee sting, along with hyaluronidase to increase penetration.

There was also an interesting thermite concoction I could use, such that I would be able to combine the bombardier method of delivery with an inert group of chemicals that, when combined, would create a chemical similar to thermite – a focused flamethrower or merely a burning effect, and could be layered to melt through objects like metal. It would provide great utility, and allow me to break through any metallic armours.

Non-lethal options were also necessary – knockout gas and injections were a must, and would allow me to down the responders easily.

Ultimately, I decided to use a variable, switching method to allow my stingers to switch between the pain-inducing bee-sting and the knockout injection method.

The final component of my exoskeleton was inspired by the mantis shrimp. Their raptorial appendages could be deployed at blinding speeds, equivalent to the velocity of a gunshot from a twenty two calibre rifle. With some modification, they could be fired as well, at the expense of some speed. If the ends were slightly blunted, they would serve well as ranged weaponry.

The method of deployment could not be replicated with my own limbs, as it would tear apart the muscles, but I could integrate it into the arms of my suit, letting bones snap forward at strength sufficient to pulp normal humans. Fortunately, I would be able to reduce the power of the blow if I wanted to – ligaments could be manipulated to varying degrees of force to deliver powerful blows, or merely some blunt force.

A smaller-scale version of the bio-ventilatory system would be fitted into the mask, to allow me to breath both underwater and in hostile gas environments. Other than that, I would be unable to modify my own senses without a much more in-depth series of modifications, but all of these adaptations could be squeezed relatively easily into a bulky, roughly human sized exoskeleton, if made right.

I opened up my chrysalis and set to work.

It took nearly two full days of exhausting work to set up the exoskeleton. Designing, creating, and arranging the nucleopeptides, manipulating the amino acid production, and ensuring that the production of protein and enzymes goes smoothly. When I had finally finished the design and used some of my own genetic material to create the structure, I set it to begin gestation and production of growth hormone. It would take nearly a month to grow – I'd barely be done in time for Shadow Stalker's transfer. That would give me a scant few days to test the skeleton and make any adjustments.

If I missed the deadline... didn't know what I would do. Relocation to Boston wasn't an option – but I couldn't let that _murderer_ go unpunished.

I had to have the exoskeleton ready.

Work was... uneventful, during the time I waited. When I wasn't doing various work at the Union, I was researching the various capes, and compiling list of those I wanted to avoid at all costs. If possible, I'd prefer to not engage any parahumans, but new capes were – apparently – snapped up quickly by the gangs. As I'd mentioned, Tinkers especially so.

I jotted down various ideas for future projects. Possible creations, additions to my exoskeleton for the future, and so on. Direct injections of axons to create a neuro-immune response and cause regeneration was his main idea so far. It would need to be configured for each person's biology, so it wasn't great for use by the general public, but it would be perfect for my own use.

I jotted down a few more ideas, and I remained in silent, indignant fury. In the back of my mind, I ran through what I would do when I caught Shadow Stalker, when I caught Sophia Hess...

But I didn't really know.

When the exoskeleton was finally fully grown, I pulled it out of the chrysalis pod and laid it out on the table. I examined it for obvious weakpoints, but from the outside, it appeared fine. The muscle fibres flexed well, and use of the solvent chemical detached the pieces. Application of the counter-chemical and growth hormone regrew them, although they'd need to rest before they could be better affixed.

I donned the exoskeleton and tested out the various uses. The stingers seemed to work fine – some flexing of the wrist and they slid out easily, and a certain twist motion caused the composition to change – I used a microscope to examine the different venoms, and they did change. I was wary of testing the thermite spray, so I layered a small part of the chemical on a piece of paper. It went up in flames.

The bombardier spray also worked fine. And when I fired the mantis claw, it left a noticeable crack in the brick wall. Activating the arm-mounted springs also caused a blunt chunk of bone to lash out and slam into the wall at lightning speed, leaving a sizeable dent and causing brick dust to cascade everywhere.

The systems seemed to be working fine – I could breathe through the ventilator, at least, so that worked for now. And I could move about relatively easily – the bone of the exoskeleton was quite flexible.

The final product was a dirty grey with various whorls and patterns across it, along with small outcroppings of bone jutting out by happenstance. Looking at it objectively... it was quite intimidating.

It was perfect.

-/-/-/-


	3. Chapter 3

**Phylum 1.3**

The transport van was just ahead of me. I was standing between two buildings, waiting for the van to get closer so that I could interrupt it. This was the one that contained Sophia – that contained Shadow Stalker. That much I knew. The file had mentioned that there was the possibility of a Protectorate hero being present, due to security risks. Or maybe just because of the possibility of her running.

That wouldn't happen.

I didn't have back up. Coil had called me again a few nights before the transport was due to take place and offered, but I'd turned him down. I didn't need to be in his debt any more than I already was. Hopefully I wouldn't need them – but I should be prepared for anyone who was already there. If they called in backup I would be in trouble, but the plan was to be gone before that happened.

I said plan – I still didn't know exactly what I was going to do. The notion of coming face-to-face with Taylor's... _killer,_ filled me with both dread and fury.

I let out a heavy breath. It sounded strangely distorted through the bio-ventilator. I readied myself; the van was approaching. I took several short breaths as it approached, then blinked twice. As the sound of the engine got louder, I charged forward.

I hit the front of the van side on, sending it swerving to the side, off the street. The bumper crumpled, as I slammed into it, and it screeched to a halt. I backed off as one of the two PRT members tried to confront me, but I backhanded the him away as he tried to foam me. The other on was trapped beneath the dented door of the van, but he yelled for me to stop and tried to foam me.

It was easy enough to avoid the spray and sting him with the knockout jab. He struggled beneath the dented door for a little longer, then slumped. I crept round to the back, as the sound of yelling and banging got louder. Shadow Stalker.

I slowly placed my gauntleted hands on the handles, then yanked the whole set of double doors off their hinges. I had the brief moment to see a smirking Sophia, before a blurring figure slammed into me and sent me flying.

I tumbled heels over head and landed on my back. Fortunately, taking the durability hormone and treating the armor with it appeared to have worked – I was unharmed, apart from the hit on the head.

I scrambled to my feet. The hero that had been with Sophia in the back of the van was _Battery_. I was unclear on what her power specifically was – she was labelled as some form of Brute on ParaHumans Online, but judging by the blur when she moved there was a Mover aspect to it as well.

I stood in a ready stance, facing her. She was standing stock still, watching me warily. Sophia had stepped out the back of the van, and was now standing slightly to the side, trying to get the handcuffs off. I wasn't sure why she hadn't changed into her Breaker form, but I wasn't going to question it if it helped me.

My eyes flicked back to Battery just in time to see her come thundering forward. Stumbling back in surprise, a let off a gout of flame that caught her head on, wrenching a scream from her lips, and sending her to the ground. Her costume appeared to be largely fireproof, but there were exposed areas of skin that were burnt raw.

I walked over to her still body, flicking out a knockout stinger and reaching over to inject her – but she lashed out, apparently having feigned the injury. She hit me in the shoulder, but it was nowhere near as damaging as it had been when she had first hit me. I was barely moved by the hit, and grabbed her hand to inject her just above the wrist. She continued to struggle for longer than the PRT officer had, but I held her down until she fell unconscious.

I turned to the van. Sophia was gone. I didn't see any sign of her handcuffs, but if she had managed to get away in her Breaker form then I couldn't do anything.

I set off running, seeing if I could find the girl.

I couldn't exactly track her – although I could've easily implemented some form of tracking system, even if I just imitated a dog's. Blood hound would be best, I mused-

No. I couldn't be distracted. I focused. Logically, there had to be a reason for her not to take her Breaker form, and the Protectorate would have had some way to account for it. So there must have been some way of preventing her escape – the handcuffs?

I hadn't seen any. There was a possibility that she was still on the streets – I immediately regretted not including enhanced senses in the armour.

I kept running, peering down alleyways. I didn't know whether I was even seeing anyone there, what with how dark it was. But if I could-

I turned a street corner to see the worst possible situation.

There were four members of the Protectorate there – Armsmaster, Miss Militia, Dauntless, and Assault.

I froze. This wasn't good. Behind them, a smirking Sophia stood, slightly to the left of Armsmaster, her insufferable sneer directed at me. I said nothing as Armsmaster stepped forward.

"Identify yourself!" He proclaimed, his voice a little too loud to be comfortable. He had his signature halberd held loosely in his right hand, ready to bring to bear. Miss Militia stood to his right, some kind of assault rifle held in her hands. To his left, Dauntless, spear and shield already up and ready to attack. Assault stood with his arms crossed, staring directly at me.

My mind raced. Battery must have put out the call when the van was hit. The Protectorate members before me were the ones who arrived- in response to the attack? But why so many?

I frowned. None of this made sense. They wouldn't send four Protectorate members for an attack on a transport van, surely?

"I said, identify yourself!" Armsmaster said again.

Well... I hadn't thought much about this, but... "You can call me Kingdom." I said, my terse voice distorted by the ventilator into a vastly more threatening tone than I could manage on my own.

Armsmaster responded. "Kingdom, then. You have attacked a Protectorate member, and two PRT officers. If you come quietly you may be offered leniency."

Judging by the way that Assault shifted his shoulders and looked to the side, that decision wasn't popular among them.

For a moment I honestly considered it. Considering just telling them everything, telling them that Sophia had killed my _daughter –_ surely that would mean something. I came so close to doing so that I nearly opened my mouth, but then-

A six-legged, four-winged scaly monstrosity set down next to me. It looked over with a reptilian face, a blue light burning beneath its skin, and snorted ash. I frowned inside my armour, and then it deepened when a man in a black costume, red mask and top hat stepped off its back. He nodded to me.

"Looked like you could use a hand there, Kingdom." The man in the top hat said, emphasizing Kingdom a little too much. "We decided to lend one."

I didn't recognise them. There were four in total, including the six-legged dragon-thing and the cape in the top hat. There was a woman in a black bodysuit, emblazoned with red suns, and another man in bulky armour and a square mask. Evidently, the Protectorate members recognised them, because they tensed up and raised their weapons slightly.

"The Travellers." Armsmaster said tensely. "Added another member to you ranks, Trickster?"

"More of a temporary thing, really." The so-named Trickster said. "Thought Kingdom here could use our help."

There was a stand-off as the Travellers and me faced off against the Protectorate members. Eventually, Trickster laughed and sauntered closer. "Come on, Armsmaster. You're outnumbered and out-gunned." He nodded at Miss Militia, and the man in the bulky armour snorted. "Just give us Shadow Stalker and we'll be out of your hair."

Trickster nodded to me. I nodded back hesitantly.

Armsmaster didn't like that. "Shadow Stalker is a hero of the Protectorate. What makes you think we'd give her up to villains." Miss Militia glanced – almost nervously – at Armsmaster's back.

"Is that what we're calling heroes now?" I asked testingly. "Unapologetic _murderers_?"

Sophia tensed, ducking slightly behind Dauntless, and Armsmaster tightened his grip on his halberd. "What are you-"

I cut him off. I could already tell that he would be attempting to cover it up, even though I clearly already knew everything. "Shadow Stalker, real name Sophia Hess." I said, a ote of anger creeping into my voice – the ventilator made it sound harsh and dangerous. "Two months ago she and her two _friends_ murdered a young girl named Taylor Hebert. Madison Clements and Emma Barnes were scapegoats, set up as the only killers – with the PRT covering up the fact that she was the main instigator of the attack."

I was venting slightly. Armsmaster tried to speak up, but I overrode him. "And yet the PRT do nothing to punish her – merely transferring her to another city so that she's someone else's problem." I stepped forward, noticing that Trickster was looking at me almost nervously. "So why don't you hand her over, and we'll give her the punishment she deserves."

Armsmaster is silent for a few moments, then says, "Shadow Stalker, come here." Miss Militia jerked almost comically in surprise. When Shadow Stalker did nothing, he repeated it. "I said, come _here_!"

Trembling, Sophia walked forward, and into view. "Y-you're not actually gonna... A-are you?" She said, coming slowly. I watched intently. As she got close, Armsmaster brought his halberd to bear. I frowned, tensing.

"Request backup immediately!" He yelled into some kind of comm, then struck her handcuffs from her wrists and shoved her away. "Run!"

I was instantly running forward, even as the Protectorate sprang into action. Assault leapt toward me, his right cross aimed right at my face even as he somehow remained in the air far longer than possible. I brought my right hand up to block it, but he brushed it aside without looking and gave me a hard punch to the face, hitting harder than possible.

I was knocked back, but didn't fall. Instead, I raised my right hand delivered a caustic spray to his exposed lower face. Roaring in anger, he stumbled back, and I heard Trickster yell, "Kingdom! Here ya go!"

I barely had moment to turn around and asked what he meant when I was suddenly somewhere else, down the street. In the distance, I saw Dauntless run face first into a motorbike that had appeared out of nowhere, but I was focused on the immediate. Running straight towards me was Sophia.

Upon seeing me ahead, she didn't slow down. Her eyes widened slightly, but she lowered herself further into a runner's stance and, if anything, increased her speed. I lowered myself into a defensive stance, preparing a spray of flames as I had done with Battery.

But when Sophia got close, she took on her Breaker state, becoming shadow and passing right through my gout of flame. And through me.

She passed through my body, re-materialized, and kept running. I spun and pounded after her, charging as fast as I could. I let off another gout of flame, hoping to catch her unawares, but she must have heard the release of the gas and became shadow once more.

I nearly snarled inside my armour. This wasn't working – she was faster than me, and she was getting away. I kept silent, however, and kept running – only to slow and stop as a six-legged dragon knocked her off her feet. She got up and turned to shadow, trying to pass through, but the street suddenly blazed into luminosity, as a miniature sun burst into existence. I saw her hesitate, not wanting to risk being unable to pass through the sun.

She stopped and fell to her knees, hands raised above her head. Her jaw was set, and her eyes blazed with fury, but she was beaten.

Trickster stepped in beside me, placing a hand on my shoulder, and nodded. The man in the bulky armour was further to the left.

I stepped forward and jabbed her with the knockout injection. She swayed momentarily, then collapsed bonelessly.

I seized her in a bridal carry and laid her out on the back of the six-legged dragon, not particularly gently. I was so close. There was a pressure building up in my stomach, some kind of sick longing, mixed with anticipation. It scared me a little, because it came a little too close to the anger I was used to feeling.

The other Travellers got on the back of the six-legged dragon as it prepared to take flight. _There's no way it's doing that on just wingbeats,_ I mused. _The aerodynamics are impossible. Heat vents of some kind?_

"Would you like to be carried with us?" Trickster asked, peering down at me from the back of the dragon. Hesitantly, I shook my head.

"I think that might just overburden you. I'll walk, I think." I saw him exchange glances with the two other members. "As long as I can trust you, that is."

Trickster nodded once. I couldn't tell if he was smiling, but he seemed reassured. "We'll see you back at the base, then. Just follow the dragon. And quickly. Reinforcements will be arriving any second now."

I nodded, and the dragon took off. _Interesting,_ I thought as I watched it fly away. _Muscular torsion to grant extreme strength, with helium vents. Terribly impractical in the longterm, but I suppose they might not have to worry about that._

I broke into a jog, following the vague smudge in the night sky.

When I arrived, there were various soldiers waiting to meet me. The dragon touched down next to me, and began to break down. A parahuman power itself, then, not a tinker product of some kind. The Travellers were invited one way, whilst two soldiers indicated that I should follow them.

They lead me through a series of winding passages, going down underground, until I was face to face with an office of some sort. The soldiers stopped there, and took positions either side of the door. Haltingly, I raised a hand to knock, then paused as the door opened automatically.

I walked in. There was a man in a skintight black bodysuit sitting at the desk, but otherwise the room was quite bare. He nodded to me, and stood as I approached. We shook hands, and I took a seat in a nondescript black chair.

"To business, then," the man I assumed must be Coil said. "You have Shadow Stalker. I am perfectly willing to hold her here for a few days, at least until you can sort out your living situations."

"I don't think there's enough _space_ to hold her where I'm living." I admitted. "It's already pretty cramped. I'm so limited in what I can do..."

A smile slid onto Coil's face. "Perhaps I can assist in this regard." He stood and walked round his desk, striding over to the door and opening it without pausing. I followed, and we strode past the guards, who moved to follow.

"You see, I have been anticipating your need for much more opportune workspace." He said without looking back at me. "I've set up a suitable area for you in which to work."

We walked on in silence for a little longer, before coming to a large set of grey double doors. Coil stepped forward to push them open, revealing a large expanse. There were desks and workbenches set up at various places around the perimeter of the room, shelves stacked with chemicals, and at the back, a miniature _zoo_ , the whole wall covered in various animal cages, containing various quite exotic snakes, insects, fish, and a monkey, of all things.

Atop the workbenches were microscopes, scalpels, various saws and needles, and on one, an actual perspex, rectangular box which, at closer inspection, I saw contained a full set of organs. I nearly asked where he had gotten them, before thinking better of it.

"This is..." I gaped at the expense Coil must have gone to. There was almost everything I needed, here. It was perfect. "Incredible." I felt sure that if I had known what Coil's face looked like right now, I would have seen the smuggest smirk. I didn't even care – this was a godsend. There was even a table pushed up against one wall, that could be wheeled out into the centre for when I was operating on something.

"I take it that the facilities are to your liking?" I was right. The cultured voice was radiating smugness at almost irritable levels.

"I'll still need some of the objects from my previous lab." I said absently. "The chrysalis, most of all."

I turned back to Coil. He was nodding, and as I watched called a guard over to him and told him to organise a retinue to retrieve it. The guard nodded and went back to the doors of the lab, before disappearing round the corner.

"Is that all?" He asked. At my nod, he continued. "We can hash out the details of your use of this facility later, but for now... I believe the Travellers wished to speak to you?"

I blinked inside my suit. Why would they...? I couldn't think of a reason that they would want to speak to me, not in the slightest. Well, they had helped me out today, possibly even saved my life, so...

I nodded to Coil, and strode past him, out into the hallway, and paused. I realised that I didn't _actually_ know where anything was – fortunately, Coil ordered one of the guards to escort me to where the Travellers were residing.

We traipsed through corridors and across walkways for a good ten minutes before we arrived at the room they were staying in, making me wonder just how extensive this base was. Did it extend under the whole of downtown?

My musings were cut off as the guard knocked on the door, nodded to me, and returned to his duties. The door swung open to reveal an unmasked Trickster on the other side. He practically grinned when he saw me, but his body language screamed nervousness.

"Kingdom!" He said, reaching out to shake my hand. "We didn't get properly introduced back there, did we? Well, I'm Trickster, this is Ballistic, Sundancer, and Genesis." He indicated the man in the bulky armour, the girl in the outfit emblazoned with red suns, and the girl in the wheelchair. That would be easy enough to fix, I mused absently.

"Well, uh, I'm Kingdom." I nodded to them, and the three of them exchanged pleasantries with me. Trickster broke in.

"In the briefing, Coil said that you were a Tinker focusing on biological systems, right?" He asked anxiously. I nodded hesitantly.

"I haven't found the specifics of my speciality, but something like that, yes."

Trickster let out a relieved sigh. "In that case... I've got something of a favour to ask."

The three others tensed, staring at Trickster intensely. Sundancer spoke up. "Do you think that he can-"

Trickster was already nodding, and Genesis was grinning wildly. Even Ballistic, who had been somewhat stoic, had a happy little smile stuck on his face.

"Uh..." I was somewhat bewildered at their response. "Well, you did save me back there, so I suppose I do owe you- do you need me to fix Genesis's legs, or something?"

Genesis's smile faded somewhat and she shook her head. "It's related to my power, so..."

I nodded, still confused. Trickster was stepping out of the room, guiding me after him before I could ask again.

"There's someone else we'd like you to take a look at, actually." He took a set of stairs, led us through several winding passageways, before we came to the door of the vault. Instead of opening it up, Trickster guided my eyes to a screen mounted on the side, that lit up as he tapped a button beneath it.

My eyes widened. "Well." I said. "That's..."

"Yeah." Trickster said, but I couldn't tear my eyes from the monstrous thing on the screen.

-/-/-/-


	4. Chapter 4

**Phylum 1.4**

I closed up the chrysalis, and massaged the growth organ, beginning the gestation process. It would only take the simulacra a week or so to grow to full size, at which point they'd be about four foot. Not particularly strong or clever, but they could recognise voice commands and carry them out competently. They were the perfect assistants – if I said so myself.

That done, I returned to the tissue sample I'd collected from Noelle. Upon finding out that I actually could help, she was eager to give me anything I'd needed. Unfortunately, it looked like just the tissue sample wouldn't be able to help. I had some suspicions, but I needed more evidence, more tests. I needed to know more about where parahumans got their 'para' from.

Powers were controlled by the Corona Pollentia and Corona Gemma. Ideally, criminals would be dealt with by removing the two, stopping them from using them. Except it didn't always work out that way. There was no way to predict where the two growths were going to be located within the brain – they could remain at the very forefront, or tucked in under the folds, or on two different sides of the brain entirely.

Secondly, you _had_ to destroy both. Destroy one, and they would just lose control of their power – and not as in, unable to access it. No, it would be full on out of control. Pyrokinetic capes would be constantly emitting flames, speedsters would be unable to slow down – it would be chaos.

That was why the Birdcage had been invented. It was the easiest way to get rid of these powered capes- especially since execution wasn't always an option. If a cape could control their own bones, what was to stop them from blocking a lethal injection? Or a hundred other expensive methods, for that matter?

At least, that was the only reason I could see for why there were so many still alive.

But I digressed. The reason for my focus on the Pollentia and Gemma – it could help with healing Noelle. If I was right and the growth was caused by an improperly formed Gemma, then simply removing it should stop further growth. But it wouldn't affect the growth that was already formed.

So I would do what no other doctor had ever done before and perform a brain transplant.

Or rather, I would grow another body, along with some parts of the brain, and transplant the memory centres and other essential parts of the brain – but not the Pollentia and Gemma. Noelle would not gain any of her old powers.

Hopefully.

I was still in the planning stage for the operation, I was nowhere _near_ ready for the actual transplant – it was something that had never been tried before, possibly not even by other capes. I was willing to take it slow, perform some experiments first. The key would be to keep the brain _alive_ whilst it was being transferred-

But I was getting sidetracked. Coil had, just the night before, asked me to make a decision about what to do with Sophia- with Shadow Stalker. And... I still hadn't come to one.

I rolled the cushy black chair away from the workbench and leaned back, massaging my temples. Absently, I noticed I still hadn't removed my surgical gloves, and a smear of blood had wiped away on the sides of my head. I tutted and got up, pulling the gloves off and binning them, then wiping away the blood with scrubbing sponge.

I turned, and looked off to the side. The lab had actually been _larger_ than I had initially thought, with a whole 'nother room almost empty – there had been one wooden table with a post-it note stuck to it, declaring, 'If you want anything else, we'll put it here.'

I'd already requested some containment tubes, which I intended to use as an upgraded chrysalis for growing things. For now, though, the room was bare – except for a single workbench in the middle of the room, with one Sophia Hess strapped down to it. I walked in and even from this distance, I could see micro-expressions fluttering across the monster's face. Mainly fear and anger.

I suppressed a little flutter of _fury_ , that she had the _gall_ to believe she had any right to be angry here- _deep breaths, Danny, deep breaths,_ I reminded myself.

She couldn't do much more than that, however – the paralysing agent I had cycling through her blood wouldn't let her. I shook my head and returned to my black roller chair. I sighed a little, and decided that working a little longer on the Noelle issue would help clear my head.

-/-/-/-

An hour later, I was no closer to making a decision about Sophia, but I had gotten a lot farther in my work on Noelle's brain transplant. I glanced up at the clock, away from the diagrams I'd been measuring out on some A3 paper. _20 past 11_ , I noticed absently. _There was something I needed to do..._

"Shit!" I swore aloud, standing up abruptly. My meeting with Coil was in ten minutes... Deep breaths, Danny, deep breaths. You have time.

I bulled on the bone-plate ask I'd Tinkered up for non-exoskeleton cape meetings. It was angled slightly, didn't cover my eyes, and had a faint impression of teeth on the front, adding to the intimidation factor. That's what everything I built seemed to prioritise- looking or being dangerous. I wasn't sure if it was appropriate to meeting with Coil, and he already knew my civilian identity... Still, appearances must be kept.

I opened the grey double doors, nodding to the guard posted just outside them. I couldn't tell who it was – they all kept their faces covered, no matter what – and I had no idea of their names. I knew they were more for my protection, though, than to stop me from leaving. Coil had made it very explicit that I was free to leave whenever I wanted to.

I had gotten used to... Most of the layout of the facility now. Well, I knew the way from my lab, to Coil's office, to the exit, so I could get to the most important places. I still had to have one of the guards escort me to Noelle's cell whenever I needed to get samples, and there were vast swathes of unexplored facility that I didn't even _want_ to try and traverse. But I had the important places.

I made it Coil's office without incident. As usual. I waited just long enough for the doors to open _without_ them opening to raise my hand to knock, only for the doors to slide open just as I was about to. I supposed it was some kind of power play by Coil, although honestly it made him seem a little childish to me.

Inside was Coil, in his black bodysuit, and, off to one side, a boy in what appeared to be a renaissance-faire costume, along with a porcelain white mask and a little crown atop long brown locks. I looked at him oddly for a moment, and could've sworn I saw him smile, despite being unable to see anything about his face behind the mask.

"Ah, Kingdom." Coil was waiting for me as I entered, various stacks of paper neatly arranged on his desk – enough to make him seem busy, but not so much to make him seem overworked, I noticed. It was a strategy I'd often seen employed by the higher-ups in the mayor's building – something I'd even used myself, back when I was excited to be head of the Union. "Right on time." I glanced up at the clock – I was a little early, fortunately. "Now, I understand that you've come up with a solution to the issue with Shadow Stalker?"

"In a word..." I hesitated. "No. I... Can't come up with something that seems bad enough for what she's done without... _Killing_ her, and that's obviously unfeasible."

"Indeed," Coil observed. "In that case, I think _I_ have an answer to your problems." He gestured, and the ren-faire boy stepped forward. He was a teen, I noticed. Must have been fairly close in age to Taylor- I cut off that line of thought quickly. "This is Regent, a member of the Undersiders. His power, according to the PRT, is short bursts of nerve interference that cause someone to temporarily lose control of their limbs."

Regent nodded. "Pleasure to meet you," he said, an undercurrent of humour laced in his words. I frowned.

"Likewise."

"In actuality," Coil broke in, "Regent is able to take control of a person's whole nervous system, given enough time – essentially, take control of their body." I blinked, eyes slightly widened.

"That..." I paused. Was I willing to submit Sophia Hess, the 'hero' Shadow Stalker, to the loss of her will, and throw her to the whims of this teenage boy?

"That sounds perfect," I replied.

Hell fucking yes I was.

-/-/-/-

Regent was escorted to my laboratory, where he would begin his takeover of Shadow Stalker's body. I had wanted to be there to watch, but Regent had convinced me that he needed intense focus to do so, and I wouldn't exactly be conducive to such, looming over his shoulder the whole time. I had acquiesced.

"So, does this mean the Undersiders are on your payroll?" I asked, having remained in Coil's office for a moment.

"They are," Coil answered shortly. "Why?"

"The Master, Hellhound, with the monsters... How does that power... _Work_?" I asked, hesitantly. I had a theory that I wanted to test out, but I needed to observe the girl's power in action in order figure it out."

"As I understand, she prefers Bitch," Coil noted, almost casually. "And as far as her power works – well, I'm unsure of the specifics, obviously, but it appears that she places her hand on a dog, closes her eyes, and said dog grows into the 'hellhounds' that the media named her after."

"And these are just regular, normal dogs?" I asked, for clarification. Coil answered in the affirmative, and I nodded, thinking to myself for a moment.

"If you could arrange a meeting with this, ah, 'Bitch,' so that I could see her power in person, I think I might be able to use it in my own work." I stated, somewhat hesitantly. Coil appeared to think for a moment.

"Very well." He replied, and some small part of me danced with glee at the thought of observing this power up close. "But after this, we _will_ be talking about my own commission of your powers. Agreed?" I could tell it wasn't really a question.

"Of course," I replied promptly. Wouldn't do to upset the new boss, now, would it?

-/-/-/-

I returned home for the night after that, wondering what on earth I was doing. Every now and then I'd have a moment where I thought, 'I'm keeping a teenager locked in the basement of a supervillain's lair. What the fuck am I doing?' Then I would think back to who I was keeping there, what she had done, and I'd feel something in my stomach _sicken..._

I discarded my costume to come home, storing most everything at Coil's base now. I didn't want anyone who might come round to accidentally find anything incriminating. The basement of my house had been scoured of all evidence, wiped clean of any biological remains, and cleared of equipment.

I collapsed into bed at a little past midnight, exhausted, burnt-out, and dreading going to work in the morning.

-/-/-/-


	5. Chapter 5

**Phylum 1.5**

"I don't care, long as I get paid." The butch girl with the dog mask stated bluntly, half-squaring up to me. She was rather confrontational about the whole thing, with Coil having set up a day for the two of us to meet. Despite that, she had needed a sizeable sum of money in order to be willing to help me out. It was... A little jarring, honestly.

Still, I had work to do. "You will," I responded shortly. "So just use your power."

I watched as she shrugged one shoulder, then bent down to the large Rottweiler at her side. I could tell with ease that she cared for the dog, probably more than she cared for anyone else. She treated it with an amount of love and respect that I had rarely seen in others, particularly towards what amounted to a pet.

She pressed a hand to his neck, and focused. The dog huffed a little, then rolled its head as it began to grow. Splits in its side opened up, as its whole body stretched and writhed with meet, spurs of bone thrusting out fairly randomly from its sides and, within moments, the dog was now a giant hound, its head just above Bitch's.

That was impressive.

"I was hoping to take a few samples, run some tests." I stated, looking at Bitch and trying to ignore the literal hellhound standing a few feet away from me. I was wearing my bone-plate mask, with the teeth impressions. Bitch hadn't given any sign of noticing or even caring.

She frowned at that. "That wasn't in the deal." She argued gruffly.

"The deal was just, 'meet with Kingdom and demonstrate your power,'" I replied. I had experience with haggling over deals like this. "'Demonstrate' covers me taking samples."

I recognized that Bitch was having trouble sorting through whether that was true or not. She didn't seem like she experienced a lot of social interaction, so this was probably a lot of unexplored territory for her.

"... Fine." She eventually answered, clearly giving up on sorting through the implications. "A few samples. Just don't hurt him."

"I won't," I said simply. Approaching with a syringe, plastic scraper, and couple of petri dishes, I stroked a hand lightly down the once-dog's head. I used a Petri dish to catch some lingering drool as it dripped from the corner of his mouth, before placing it on the workbench. Then I knelt down next to the beast's foot, pushed apart its toes, and used the scraper to grab some dead skin cells, into the second Petri dish.

"Fair warning," I said directly to Bitch. "I want to take some blood, with this." I held up the syringe. "It might sting a little bit, but it won't hurt him too much." I raised an eyebrow at her, still holding up the syringe. She didn't look too happy, but I spoke again before she could outright deny me. "If I'm right, then you'll get more than a bit of money. I might be able to give you something that'll let you fight a little better."

"The fuck does that mean?" Bitch asked, and I could tell she was getting annoyed.

"You'll find out, if you let me take a blood sample." I replied, and I could practically feel her anger flare up. I could sympathise, but if I was right about this... I could help out Noelle _and_ the Undersiders.

"Fuck, _fine_." She finally relented. I smirked internally. _You got a long way to go if you think you can cut me on a deal, kiddo_ , I thought, as I brought up the syringe and pushed it slowly into the dog's shoulder.

"What's his name?" I asked as I slowly began to draw blood.

"... Brutus." She replied shortly, evidently still cross. Finally, I removed the syringe, and placed it next to the two Petri dishes. I chuckled at that, though – I doubted Bitch had an accurate view of the historical context of that name, so she probably chose it because it sounded like 'brute.' Which, for some reason, I found ironic. Bitch and Brute.

"Alright, thank you." I said, making sure that all the samples were in no danger of falling off the desk. "You can change him back now." She shot me a dirty look at that, probably because I was telling her what to do. Wordlessly, she laid a hand on Brutus' shoulder – over where I had taken blood – and gently rubbed it. I was impressed at how quiet and unmoving the dog had been, honestly. Bitch must have been a hell of a trainer.

The dog fell to it's knees and lay down, writhing in place. I stepped forward worriedly – it looked like it was in a lot of pain – but Bitch ignored me, keeping her hand on Brutus' shoulder. Chunks of flesh began to drop off him at an alarming rate, falling to floor with wet little _splat_ s. I blinked, as more and more chunks of the dog dropped away, leaving... That same Rottweiler, curled up in a little ball, in the centre of the rapidly-decaying meat.

I blinked, shocked.

"Wait... So it doesn't actually grow?" I asked. "The monsters just... grow _around_ the dogs?"

Bitch shrugged. "Dunno." She muttered, scratching Brutus' head and murmuring to him. I watched as she seemingly thanked the mutt for... Standing there? Well, I guess it was Bitch's choice how she trained her dogs.

The few chunks of flesh left were rapidly decaying into smaller and smaller pieces, and before one of them could fully degrade I grabbed the scraper and a spare Petri dish, dragging the flesh into the plastic case. It still kept decaying, but hopefully I'd be able to get something out of the detritus that was left over.

I grabbed a microscope, pushed some of the matter onto a clear glass plate, took a seat, and put the flaps over the sides to hold it in place, before taking a look down the lens at the leftovers of Bitch's hellhound.

"Can I go now?" She asked, sounding annoyed. I grunted at her vaguely, far too engrossed in what I was doing to give a clear answer. She apparently took that as a _yes_ , because a few moments later I heard the double doors of my lab swing shut.

-/-/-/-

Bitch's power was _significant_ in a way I hadn't truly appreciated. Not just because it created a suit of living armour around whatever she used it on- no, that was just one facet. It _preserved_ what it contained, kept it alive, and allowed it to control the suit. Implying that it kept brain function active and kept the body alive.

Of course, that wouldn't mean much, the body itself usually had it's own systems to rely on, so keeping it alive wouldn't matter- but as long as the brain had lungs to breathe with, it could stave off death for quite some time. I had my vessel for Noelle's brain transplant.

It would need testing, of course, and the preparation of the body to put it into would take even longer, but this was _great_ news.

I had promised Bitch, though – I really did have an idea for helping her teammates fight better, and it would work as a gift to Regent as well, for taking Shadow- Sophia off of my hands. Bitch's power only applied to dogs, for some... Needlessly obscure reason, possibly to do with the circumstances in which she got her powers. But I had no such restriction – I could adapt something that would work on people.

It took a solid three hours, from eight in the evening to eleven at night, to draw up the plans and begin manufacturing – but pretty soon I had a working example. A Seed, a disk of cartilage, flesh and bone about the size of my palm.

It hadn't really struck me before just absorbing Tinkering was – I had my idea, I had a method to work on it, I had material, and I had an example to work from, and once I had that... I didn't have much control over what happened. I got to work, prodding and manipulating, adding hormones and enzymes and reconfiguring to get the desired result, but... It was almost like I wasn't consciously choosing what I was doing, I just entered a fugue state where I _knew_ how to get what I wanted to build.

Which is how I realised that I... Didn't actually have any idea how the Seed worked. I knew how it worked _overall_ – it rapidly grew a suit of biological armour around the user – but I had no idea how it got the actual mass, because there was no way that came about through liberal use of growth hormone – which, admittedly, was incorporated.

I didn't have much of a knowledge of physics, but I knew enough to realise that was breaking _some_ law of physics, somewhere. Conservation of mass? Something like that.

I stood up abruptly from the second chrysalis manufacturing the Seeds. There was a notebook on another workbench containing the various Tinker ideas I'd had, it was worth noting this down as something to take another look at later.

I scribbled quickly into the notebook a few messy sentences that would hopefully be enough to jog my brain back onto the memory, remind me of the implications of Bitch's power. Hell, if I remembered I could be able to extrapolate that and-

I cut myself off of that line of thought. The chrysalis had already spit out another Seed, and would continue to create another one every ten minutes, until I had a decent store of them. Right now they were fairly simple – they constructed the suit based off of a quick DNA sample, but I would soon begin creating some more customized ones.

I'd looked up the Undersiders, seen some information and some pictures. They weren't obviously linked to Coil, but Regent and Bitch had both helped me out, so I was inclined to pay them back. I wanted to make some Seeds that would be clear substitutes for their costumes, to give them actual combat effectiveness and hopefully help them out a little more. Of course, that would mean I'd be helping wanted criminals pull off crimes...

 _You crossed that bridge and burned it behind you a long time ago, Danny_ , I reminded myself a little morbidly. _Only way to go now is forward._

I returned to the workbench. I had set up three chrysalises so far – One was still growing the simulacra, one was producing Seeds, and the third was still dormant. I hadn't been using it for anyone, but I needed to. I was still indebted to Coil, and he was going to be giving me commissions soon enough. The setup I had now... Wasn't enough.

I set the the third chrysalis to producing another, grabbing a pair of tubes from a shelf full of them, and poured the contents into the input ventricle. The enzymes would begin the work on building the necessary structures, and a _little_ bit of growth hormone...

It would take about a day to produce another chrysalis, after which I could double my production if I set the new one to making a chrysalis. Pretty soon I'd have enough to start integrating them into the growth tubes, and then I'd _really_ be in business.

I massaged the chrysalis organ, and returned to the Seed-producing chrysalis. I glanced up at the clock and saw that it was nearing midnight – fortunately, I didn't have work tomorrow. All-nighter it was.

-/-/-/-

I awoke slumped over at my workbench, being prodded in the shoulder by a female soldier with the butt of her gun. I jerked a little as I returned to full consciousness, blinking up at the soldier. She nodded at me, then backed off a few paces as I attempted to surreptitiously wipe away the drool on my cheek.

"Coil wants you in his office in half an hour, sir." She stated, looking past me. I nodded, hesitantly.

"Right, ah, thank you." I replied, rubbing the dust out of the corners of my eyes. The soldier saluted, turned on her heel, and marched out. _Military training?_ I wondered. Coil must have had some pretty good contacts to grab guys with that training, right?

I glanced in front of me. The five cases I had set up were basically full. One for unreserved soldiers, that would give them a fairly bland, uniform suit, and four customized to the specifications of each of the Undersiders. They were colour-coded for ease of use.

I went over to the third chrysalis, to see that it was about halfway done with the next chrysalis. I ensured it was topped up with enzymes and growth hormone, then checked the first chrysalis. The simulacra was still four or so days away, at which point I'd have two workers to help out around the lab.

That done, I returned to my workbench, and decided to spend the next half-hour working on the Noelle problem. As long as I could get that suit to grow a working pair of lungs... But then how would I connect that to the brain?

-/-/-/-

"... Will provide a _heavy_ combat boost to your soldiers, effectively giving them a decent Brute and Mover rating." I reported to Coil. "Functionality _will_ require refitting your weapons and uniforms, but... I believe it is worth it to have soldiers able to compete with parahumans."

"Excellent work, Kingdom." Coil replied, and although I couldn't see his face, I imagined he had a wide smile plastered all over it. "Anything else?"

"Ah..." I hesitated. "I was also planning to give it to the Undersiders, as a thank you for Regent... Taking care of my problem. If I might ask, what happened to...?"

"Shadow Stalker, as I understand it, has defected from the Wards and now works with the Undersiders as a companion on their missions. Her phasing ability has proved... Most useful." Coil informed me, and for a moment I felt sickness as thrill war in my stomach.

"Thank you, sir." I replied carefully, bowing my head a little.

"I'll have some of my men deliver the Seeds to the Undersiders later." Coil said. "I must commend you on your forward-thinking, Kingdom. Continue at this rate and you might just get a team of your own."

I blinked. That... Was a _lot_ of responsibility for someone so new to the organisation, wasn't it? Why did Coil think he could rely on me for something like that?

I exited the office quietly, but I didn't feel like Tinkering any more. I just wanted to go home and drink myself into a stupor for the weekend.

I nodded to the soldier outside my lab as I locked up, carefully stowing the bone-plate mask on the wall rack, and left Coil's base.

There was a bottle of whiskey waiting for me at home, and I intended to change that.


	6. Chapter 6

**Phylum 1.6**

It took me a little over half an hour to whip up a decent hangover cure, and only a few more minutes for it to take effect. Hangovers were really just massive dehydration anyway, so it was a fairly simple solution overall. Still, it was fairly easy to make, and I whiled away the rest of the morning building up a decent stock.

It was a Saturday, and honestly, I wasn't sure about work hours with Coil. On the one hand, the whole job seemed like more of a, 'do work when you think you can/want to' type deal. On the other, Coil seemed like the kind of guy who'd kill your whole family if you wronged him.

Course, I don't have much to worry about on that front. I thought bitterly to myself, my mood quickly souring.

I dressed in silence, whiling away the monotony ruminating more on the Noelle problem. Manipulating the Seeds to get them to grow lungs wouldn't be too difficult, at its core it was just a minor addition to the base code, but attaching them to the brain was the real problem-

*THUMP*

Was that... Someone knocking on my door? I wasn't expecting anyone, and surely Coil would have told me if he was sending over one of his men... I moved over to grab the baseball bat I kept in my closet in case of intruders. Stupid, really, I thought to myself. I could make something much more dangerous than a baseball bat.

*THUMP*

Someone else then? But who? It couldn't be... The Protectorate? Had they somehow figured out I was the new cape who had kidnapped Shadow Stalker? I carefully made my way downstairs, towards the front door, and the vague shadow I could see in the window. I wasn't exactly being subtle about my hatred for her... I'd hoped they'd believe I was just some justice zealot, but... I shook myself internally. Come on, Danny, don't be an idiot. If the Protectorate really knew it was you, they wouldn't bother knocking, they'd break down the fucking door!

*THUMP*

Jesus, calm down, I thought, a little less seriously. I'm barely down the stairs and you're knocking. I arrived at the door, moved the baseball bat to my left hand so that whoever it was wouldn't see it, and slightly inched open the door.

A teenaged girl was on the other side, looking down at her phone, one arm absently raised, presumably in order to knock again. She had a smattering of freckles across her nose and upper cheeks, and dark blonde hair. I frowned. The hell...?

She glanced up as I opened the door, and her eyes flicked down, taking in my slightly ruffled attire. "You can put the bat away, Danny." The girl said, the slight smile still remaining. "I just want to talk."

What the fuck?

-/-/-/-

Lisa Wilbourne – the supervillain and Undersiders member known as Tattletale. She was... Nice, if a bit suspicious. Her power... It was some kind of enhanced deduction, which admittedly made me a little wary of talking to her.

Regardless, she'd invited me along to Fugly Bob's, ostensibly to talk about further collaboration between her team and I. Of course, I suspected that there was something else behind this – and if I knew, she probably knew that I knew, but then I knew-

I cut myself off as I saw Lisa quirk a smile at me, glancing at me from the corner of her eye. Had she noticed that I was obsessing over the complexities of her power? It suddenly hit me how irritating it could be talk to someone with Lisa's powers.

Lisa had been mostly silent on the walk there, more focused on her phone than on me, but we arrived in a timely manner and took a seat. I glanced around, memories of the last time I'd been here hitting me. That pair of idiots who had decided it would be a good idea to rob a restaurant in downtown at midday.

Finally, once we'd ordered, waited a few minutes for the drinks to arrive, and waited some more, Lisa put her phone face-down on the table. I eyed it warily, wondering if she were talking to Coil and reporting on my actions so far. It wasn't out of line for me to go to lunch with a colleague, was it?

… That sounded a little less creepy in my head, given that the girl in front of me was more than half my age.

"I'm not reporting to Coil, if that's what you were wondering." Lisa cut in on my introspection, and I jerked a little to her talk, after such a long silence.

"Who were you texting, then?" I asked, still not totally reassured by her words. The slight grin on her face - halfway between a smirk and genuine smile - seemed to deepen at that, like she was laughing at some private joke.

"The only member of my team you haven't met yet." She paused.

"Grue, I supplied." I paused for a moment. "He's the one that generates darkness, isn't he?" This time, I paused. "Wait, is he named after that old text-based computer game… Zork? 'It is dark, you are likely to be eaten by a grue?'"

Lisa let out a loud, surprised laugh at that before clapping her hands to her mouth and glancing around, faux-embarrassed. The endearing behaviour was reminiscent of an earlier, better time, with my own daughter…

Don't go there, Danny, I told myself. Don't project, and don't think about her.

I refocused back on Lisa, who appeared to be gathering herself from her impromptu outburst. "No, no," she replied, her lips still upturned from my, apparently hilarious, question. "It's from 'gruesome,' as in horrifying." She chuckled a little. "But that is an apt comparison."

I smiled, and felt myself relaxing - only slightly - for the first time without Tinkering being involved. "Anyway," I cut in before we could get any further off topic. "You brought me here for a purpose, right? You didn't just ask an old man out here for the pleasure of his company, I assume."

Lisa coughed a little self-consciously, the tilted her head in a 'sort-of' gesture. "In a way, yes. Those… Seeds you created, we've played around with them a little… And they are incredible. So, first, I wanted to just thank you for them. I know they'll come in handy in the future." I nodded, inclining my head slightly in acknowledgement. I didn't though, sensing that she had more to say.

"So, along that vein," she looked around a little, leaning in slightly. I copied her, leaning forward in my chapter so that she could talk in a low voice with me still hearing it. "I was wondering if, when I had some extracurricular projects I was having trouble with, you might use your talents to help out? Without letting on to the boss."

I blinked a little. If I was right, Lisa was asking if she could request certain items from me - bio-Tinkered items - for her own use, without me telling Coil that I was doing so. If she was… That was a little heavy. And not telling the boss? That sounded as though she wanted to do something that Coil wouldn't approve of. Committing crimes without his permission? That didn't sound like the kind of thing he would be against, and it's not like she would be able to hide that, anyway.

I was honestly blanking on something she could do that would both require my assistance as a Tinker and would be something Coil would a) disapprove of, and b) not find out about.

But… Well, teenage girls are entitled to their privacy. I'd learned that much from the past. Still… It wouldn't feel right, just letting Lisa do whatever she wanted with my creations - that was something that I'd thought a lot about, when thinking about the things I could have done differently, could have changed, could've made things better…

Don't go there Danny, remember? I thought to myself angrily. You have to focus.

"... Sure." I said, finally, letting out a sigh. Lisa squealed like a little girl, leant over the table, and gave me a quick hug around my neck. I sat frozen for a moment, my memories flashing back to happier times- but I composed myself before I got lost, taking a calming breath and easing out of the hug.

Lisa seemed to sense something was wrong, but I cut her off before she could say anything - I did not want to talk about my own personal neuroses right now.

"But, I will expect a good reason for why you need it, and what you need it for, alright?" I told her sternly, looking at her over the top of my glasses. "And I reserve the right to veto anything I don't like, okay?"

Lisa looked almost put-out at that, pouting momentarily. "Alright, deal. If it's something the boss wants us to do, I might not be able to stop it, but otherwise, deal."

I nodded at her, smiling, and reached across the table to shake her hand. She clasped it delicately in her own dainty hand and beamed back at me.

"Also, there was one other-" Lisa began to say after a moment's thought, but she cut herself off. She was frowning off into the distance, at some point over my shoulder, looking simultaneously consternated and afraid.

"Uh, Lisa?" I followed her eyes, trying to discern her line of sight, but didn't see anything particularly out of the ordinary. A man with a military buzzcut, a small dish placed in front of him, hardly touched, talking on the phone. Well, more like listening on the phone. I turned back to Lisa. "Earth to Lisa, you okay?" I waved a hand in front of her face, and she jerked out of the weird starey-fugue.

"Hm? Oh, uh, yeah, I'm fine." She responded, still sounding vaguely out of it. "Just… Realized I gotta go. I'm late for a… Team meeting. Sorry to skip out on you like this, but I really do have to go." She practically leapt out of her seat, a few bills slapped hastily on the table, and she was out the door before I was out of my seat.

"Hey, wait-!" I called after her, bumping into a waitress in my hurry. "Oh, uh, sorry, here." I hurriedly yanked a few notes out of my wallet - probably a lot more than what the actual bill was, but I was in a hurry - shoved them into her hand, and rushed out. I noticed tangentially that the buzzcut guy had hung up on his phone and was heading to the bathroom, his meal untouched.

"Lisa!" I said as I left the meagre restaurant- but she was nowhere in sight. "Damnit." I sighed. I wondered why she had bailed on me so urgently, so randomly - but again, I couldn't fathom any particular reason for it. "Figuring things out is a helluva lot harder without Thinker powers, huh?" I asked rhetorically, already moving.

With nothing better to do, I headed to Coil's base, hopefully to get some Tinkering done.

-/-/-/-


End file.
